And now for something completely different........

This gorgeous little thing is the handmade handbag that I received as my secret santa gift at out patchworkers Christmas party yesterday.

It was made just for me by a lovely lady in our group who makes the most extraordinary handbags in fabric and leather. I am so thrilled with this it is just the same colour as four tops that I live in over summer so it will be well used.

CHRISTMAS TRIVIA: "RUDOLPH THE RED NOSED REINDEER"

The Chicago-based Montgomery Ward company, department store operators, had been purchasing and distributing children's coloring books as Christmas gifts for their customers for several years. In 1939, Montgomery Ward tapped one of their own employees to create a book for them, thus saving money. 34-year old copywriter Robert L. May wrote the story of Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer in 1939, and 2.4 million copies were handed out that year. Despite the wartime paper shortage, over 6 million copies had been distributed by 1946.May drew in part on the story "The Ugly Duckling" and in part from his own experiences as an often taunted, small, frail youth to create the story of the misfit reindeer. Though Rollo and Reginald were considered, May settled on Rudolph as his reindeer's name.
Writing in verse as a series of rhyming couplets, May tested the story as he went along on his 4-year old daughter Barbara, who loved the storySadly, Robert Mays wife died around the time he was creating Rudolph, leaving Mays deeply in debt due to medical bills. However, he was able to persuade Sewell Avery, Montgomery Ward's corporate president, to turn the copyright over to him in January 1947, thus ensuring May's financial security.May's story "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" was printed commercially in 1947 and in 1948 a nine-minute cartoon of the story was shown in theaters. When May's brother-in-law, songwriter Johnny Marks, wrote the lyrics and melody for the song "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer", the Rudolph phenomenon was born. Turned down by many musical artists afraid to contend with the legend of Santa Claus, the song was recorded by Gene Autry in 1949 at the urging of Autry's wife. The song sold two million copies that year, going on to become one of the best-selling songs of all time, second only to Bing Crosby's "White Christmas". The 1964 television special about Rudolph, narrated by Burl Ives, remains a holiday favorite to this day and Rudolph himself has become a much-loved Christmas icon.

THE GARDEN: My yellow squash has taken over the vegetbale garden it is growing like the plant in the Doctor Who Episode "the Day of the Triffids" I am continuing to harvest tiny little yellow zucchinis and cut them up for salads, or as "sticks for dips". That crazy bonus eggplant plant is producing one or two for kitchen per day, the tomatoes I have harvested and am waiting for them to ripen there are heaps out there and with the sun today more will be ready to come off the plants this afternoon.

And growing over all of this is the yellow squash with tiny wee little squash on it - I love yellow squash they are my favourite vegetable.

The lettuce is going great guns and tipping them out and harvesting from the sides seems to be stopping them going to seed at this stage.

I accidentally pulled up an onion yesterday it was really little but there was one there!!!

The potatoes well they are huge the ones in the tyres just keep growing I have added a third tyre to the stack (and am thinking of a fourth as the plant is almost a metre out of the top), no sign of yellowing off yet and the new ones are going great guns so hopefully we will have potatoes for most of the next few months.

My pan for today is to clean, get some baking done, weed when it is cooler, iron while we watch some silly Christmas movies,and mainly to relax into my Christmas holidays with the daisies.

Have a fantastic day - I have something really interesting for the Trivia post tomorrow. Hope you are enjoying it. Welcome to the new commenters and some new visitors who have shown up on the feedjit thingy, please feel free to leave a comment or just introduce yourself.

daisymum